The Preciousness of Time
by Deathly Noted
Summary: 11.27.2009: Matt is contacted by Mello and agrees to help him. 01.26.2010: Matt is killed by Kiyomi Takada's guards; Mello is killed by the power of Kiyomi Takada's Death Note. Read between the lines, but hurry - the clock is ticking. MelloxMatt.


**11.27.2009: Matt is contacted by Mello and agrees to help him.**

* * *

For the first time in his life, Mello almost backed down from something. 

Mello had battle scars from the years the two of them had spent apart.

Matt had a fucking _estate_ under a false name, with front gates and cupid fountains.

What kept him from leaving again were the little things: how he found Matt in the first place, too easily, as if a trail had been left for him. The security system, boastfully shown off to Mello in its prototype software form back at Wammy's House. Matt's collection of video games, half the same, though they were alphabetically organized now rather than strewn about.

It took a lot of missteps to find Matt, and when he finally did, Matt had _changed_.

Maybe it was too late. It was the little things, the littlest thing of all: the cross hanging from the headboard of the bed, the twin his own, that made him try anyway.

Jabbing the muzzle of his gun into Matt's throat, he watched wakeful recognition come into the face of this man he knew-didn't-know who knew-didn't-know him, and the dry greeting he half-expected wasn't there to comfort him, nor curses and screams to make him feel guilty where he needed to be.

Matt acted like he didn't even know him.

"How did you get past my security?" he said.

It was so empty.

"You barely changed the coding you showed me. It's like you were asking me to come in," Mello commented, pressing his gun further into Matt's flesh to keep him pinned down when he attempted to sit up. That sound of discomfort, Mello relished in it. Matt's throat was probably sensitive from smoking all those packs of cigarettes in the bottom of the kitchen waste bin, and Matt surely deserved to suffer a little for being stupid enough to smoke, as well as for making Mello stoop low enough to look through someone's trash. He hated dirtying his hands. That's why he wore gloves. That's why he didn't write names, or say them if he could help it. He could dedicate himself to a cause, but not a person. He could be honest, but not about this.

"Why are you here, Mello?" Matt asked with apparent weariness. "It's obviously not to catch up on the past. Gonna shoot me? 'Old friends are the worst enemies' or something like that? I don't know anything worthwhile about you, if you're worried I'll rat you out somehow."

"Nah. I've had enough fun with my gun for today. Your bitch almost got a bite in before I put the bullet in her skull." Mello jerked his hand back, imitating the recoil after a blast.

Matt was aghast. "_You shot my dog?_"

"Of course not," Mello said flatly. "Do you think I'm the kind of person who would shoot an innocent animal?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I do. Get out of my house, asshole."

Mello sat down, leaning into Matt's body and forcing him back into place when he attempted to squirm away, his authority asserted even as he put his weapon away with that teasing glimpse of skin. Crossing one leg over the other, Mello got comfortable against Matt's hips, close enough to feel him shaking a little, from lust or fury or fear, he wasn't sure.

"I'm here because…" _I need your help._ "There's something that has to be done, and you're the best man for the job."

"What makes you think I want anything to do with you, even if it's only a business relationship? No, _especially_ if it's only a business relationship. Do you think you can use me because we were friends? Do you think I've been hung up on you all these years, crying myself to sleep every night? Because I'm over it."

"If these crosses are anything to go by, something is hung up." Mello spoke so softly the silence almost felt uninterrupted. The flick of his wrist between the rosary around his neck and the one on the headboard was the most important thing, guiding their eyes back-and-forth as one before their gaze met again by gravitational force, and Matt's anger didn't seem diminished but perhaps shifted.

"I can't play games anymore, Mello. I already have a job, and yeah, I fucking love it, and I'm filthy fucking rich. I have the home I always wanted and the dog and the girls. I have a real life. You can have the scars."

Mello had decided to make contact with Matt on the condition that he keep their past and present separate, that he prevent history from repeating itself between them, yet something about that statement loosed his control. Fisting the collar of Matt's shirt, he raised him up to taste the insults when their lips on occasion touched.

"You call this a life? Your ridiculous mansion with mini-bars and chandeliers? You're pathetic, living here in your perfect, protective little bubble while I'm out there risking everything. You're worse than Kira himself. You're a lower breed of scum than Near, even."

"I'm worth enough, if you're here," Matt murmured, leaning in closer.

"Yeah?"

Closer.

"Yeah…"

Mello pulled away even as their lips grazed in the chastest of kisses.

"I was just leaving. I said you were the best man for the job — not the only one."

Wet whimpers were what he anticipated, some shredded plea, never that low growling sound as he was shoved backward and lost his balance, and even the retaliation he managed in pulling Matt off the bed along with him ultimately backfired. It didn't take much of a struggle for Matt to pin his arms above his head when he was already sprawled in that position, winded.

"I'll kill you." Matt's fingers slipped beneath black laces and over skin with a sensation that would have been ticklish if not for the lawless scraping of his nails. "I'll kill you and no one will care, 'cause I have the money to cover it up and nobody gives a fuck about you. Nobody gives a fuck."

"Blow me." It was an order, not an insult. Matt's features twisted, fingers curling somewhere between a grasp and a recoil against Mello's midriff before snatching up the gun and putting it to Mello's temple.

"You bastard."

"I know."

"You left me."

"I know."

"I was lying about the girls."

Mello didn't respond.

"Alright. I'll help you out, but I won't die for you or anything like that," Matt announced, finalement. "And I'm keeping my dog or the deal's off."

* * *

**A/N:** When I saw the timeline in How to Read 13 and realized Mello and Matt only spent two months reunited, honestly, I burst into tears. That's so little time… but a lot can happen in it, right? That's my concept for this fanfic. Reviews make my day, seriously, so don't be shy! 


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